Richard Grayson

January 31st, 2020

WW2 has become a rallying point for Leavers. It need not have been so

The world wars, particularly WW2, became leitmotifs for Leave campaigners. It need not have been so, writes Richard Grayson (Goldsmiths, University of London).

Today, on the day we leave the EU, I am Schrödinger’s European. As a citizen of the United Kingdom AND the Republic of Ireland, I am both leaving and not leaving the European Union. But it is the former part of that dichotomy that is obviously most on my mind today. It is making me think about how this moment fits in Britain’s history, but more than that it is causing me sadness.

As a professor of 20th century history, I spend much of my time thinking about the conflicts of that century, especially my main specialism, the first world war. On an emotional level, the second world war affects me even more through the formative stories I soaked up as a child. As someone who is 50 years old, who grew up in the UK at a time closer to the war than to now, that war was ever-present in popular culture in the things I watched on TV and the toys I played with. I was always especially gripped and influenced by stories of the French resistance and Belgian evasion lines, and with the heroism of the Dutch people who hid Jews. My maternal grandfather (strictly step-grandfather, but I knew him as just ‘Grandad’) was RAF groundcrew during the war at Northolt and worked with Polish aircrew. As I have studied the first world war professionally, I encounter daily what Britain’s connection with France and Belgium meant to those who fought, and that collaboration, renewed again in 1939, is something that inspires me emotionally.

The lesson I have always drawn from all of that history, including the story of Britain apparently ‘standing alone’ in 1940, was that Britain was always at its best when working with European allies. Britain never stood alone even in its ‘finest hour’. Famously, the Poles of 303 Squadron were the highest scoring Hurricane squadron of the Battle of Britain. Emotionally, I cheer at the fact that Churchill’s response to the imminent collapse of France was to offer an ‘indissoluble union’ between the UK and France. Once victory and then peace were secured, it has always seemed to me that it was logical to recognise that some sort of union between allies was the best bulwark against future conflict. Better still, such a union could work best if it involved former enemies. This of course, was something that the France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg came to realise before Britain, and their triumph was to draw in former enemies from the very first. For all the reasons that made Britain become involved on the continent in 1914 and 1939, it was inevitable that Britain would become involved in some kind of pooling of sovereignty with continental Europe. ‘We’ in Britain are a European nation and not only 1914 and 1939, but a thousand years of previous history and longer, should tell us that.

Can and should stories of 1914-18 and 1939-45 influence politics today? Rationally, many of my fellow historians tell me that we are far from those years; that ‘we’ today should not view those alliances of the past as ‘we’ today. I agree with them to a point. When teaching, I always talk about the ‘British army’ and the ‘German army’, never ‘them’ and ‘us’. But the connections Britain forged in those years, and the necessity of befriending former enemies, is something I feel deeply.

Sadly, the Remain campaign never articulated the emotional side of belonging to Europe. Nor has the broad political left (of which I am part), with the exception of ‘Blue Labour’, ever understood in recent years the power of history in informing belonging and locality. Too many metropolitans and cosmopolitans have never understood why someone like me, would both feel European but also feel a particular connection when visiting first world war cemeteries to graves of soldiers from Hertfordshire (where I grew up and live now) and those of the Ulster Division (in which two of my great-uncles served).

Consequently, the left and pro-Europeans have failed at articulating a vision of Europe that was able to speak to people who feel a sense of patriotism and locality but also feel European. Instead, a different version of British history was told and influenced many who voted Leave. That happened because scant attention was paid to how people felt about moments like 1940, thus allowing the right to take hold of the history as a ‘standing alone’ myth, instead of explaining that it really meant we are Europeans – because we were, even then. As a result, today is a sad day for so many of us. It will be a long haul to get back to where we should be, but the journey must start today with telling stories of Britain’s long European history.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Brexit blog, nor LSE.

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About the author

Richard Grayson

Richard S Grayson is Professor of Twentieth Century History at Goldsmiths, University of London. Dublin’s Great Wars: The First World War, the Easter Rising and the Irish Revolution was published by Cambridge University Press in 2018.

37 Comments

I am moved by this testimony. I am 72. In 1944 my father provided artillery cover for the many thousands of Polish infantry who stormed the Benedictine monastery at Monte Cassino. A thousand of them died. When I hear of Britain “standing alone” my heart shrinks. From El Alamein to Monte Cassino my father fought alongside New Zealanders and African and Indian troops whose presence has been airbrushed from British (Imperialist) history. My father-in-law fought on the Russian front with a Nazi gun at his back, deserted, went underground, survived two years hiding from the Gestapo in Luxembourg, then guided American troops resisting the Von Runstedt offensive. These men developed an historical view of Europe and the importance of its Union which shames the facile bombast of men like Farage. The British failure to teach morally and politically significant history to recent generations has enabled charlatans to masquerade in nationalist dress whilst they serve the narrow interests of extraterritorial capital. The failure we mark on this day, 31st January 2020, is profound and will continue to be profoundly damaging for decades to come.

My father was wounded on the Somme in the first world war – and was awarded the Military Medal. I agree with everything in this post and Mr Clark’s comment. The failure of the Remain campaign to articulate and press home these arguments for European integration was a major factor in the failure of that campaign.

My grandfather was a spitfire and hurricane pilot in the second World War. He embraced Britain when escaping communism in 1948 and ALWAYS said the EU was starting to take a dark form. He was concerned that Britain must leave “The EU block” before it was too late. Sadly he passed last year. He would have been so happy to see the Brexit celebrations across Britain.

There are many committed europhiles who yet feel a deep antipathy towards the eu, an organisation capable, very recently, of appointing a ‘crony’ as its senior functionary by means of a boardroom coup, eu accounts qualified every year for 20 years; whose only democratically accountable institution is simply a rubber stamp; whose politicised and partial judiciary have but one aim: ever closer union.

The idea that Britain ‘stood alone’ in 1940 simply refers to the pounding this country took from the luftwaffe for the 57 consecutive nights commencing Sept 7th 1940; over 15,000 civilian deaths.

This country, in the aftermath of war, demonstrated its compassion and commitment to its European neighbours by allowing the European Steel and Coal community, set up in 1951, to flourish under the protective umbrella of NATO, set up in April 1949, two years earlier. The British Army played its part, Major Ivan Hirst, senior resident officer in Wolfsburg, recommissioning the Wolfsburg vehicle plant as a workshop and then securing an order for 20,000 vehicles. He improved the quality of the ‘beetle’ car, and built up a network of dealers and service centres. In November 1945 he played an important part in early German trade unionism by giving instructions for the first election of an employee representation body known as the Works Council.

One of the less discussed motivations behind brexit, together with much cheaper food prices for the disadvantaged, is the hope that it may lead other European nations towards a truer, more ethical, political expression of our shared European identity than that currently offered by the egregious, and seemingly unreformable, eu.

I presume the ‘crony’ referred to in Mr Bidie’s post is Jean-Claude Juncker. How easy it is to insult someone of whom I presume you know primarily the sneers of the British popular press. Please consult his Wikipedia entry. Mr Juncker was born with no privileges, the son of a steel worker in a poor part of town (now a smart university campus) and state educated. He achieved a masters in Law at the University of Strasbourg. He served as Prime Minister of Luxembourg for 18 years, and was very widely admired in his home country and at EU level, always speaking honestly and clearly in four languages. He saw his country through difficult times during the radical shift from steel-making to financial services and is among the longest serving parliamentarians in the world, all by being democratically elected to office. It undermines the credibility of any post which resorts to cheap denigration.

In fact I refer to the controversial appointment of a functionary, Mr Selmayr, not to the erstwhile head of the eu commission executive. Mr Selmayr had been Mr Juncker’s campaign chief during his successful run for the eu presidential post in 2014. Hmmm…….

The european parliament itself called for Mr Selmayr’s resignation after the European ombudsman concluded that the EU executive had failed to follow internal procedures in his promotion, stating that they regretted the Commission’s decision to confirm Selmayr as its new Secretary-General, “disregarding the extensive and widespread criticism from EU citizens and the reputational damage caused to the EU as a whole”.

“Selmayr must resign as Secretary-General,” the Parliament resolution concluded, calling on the Commission “to adopt a new procedure for appointing its Secretary-General, ensuring that the highest standards of transparency, ethics and the rule of law are upheld”.

“The Commission created an artificial sense of urgency to fill the post of Secretary-General in order to justify not publishing a vacancy notice,” the resolution says, referring to the European Ombudsman’s inquiry into the matter.

The resolution also recalls that the Ombudsman found four instances of maladministration in Selmayr’s appointment “due to the Commission’s failure to follow the relevant rules correctly, both in letter and spirit”.

The parliamentary resolution calling for Mr Selmayr’s resignation was adopted by a majority of 71% on 13 Dec 2018. Mr Selmayr only resigned 01 August 2019 once it became clear that the next eu president would also be a German. The eu president and eu senior ‘fonctionnaire’ may not have the same nationality.

The eu parliament is a rubber stamp and the eu commission incapable of reforming itself. Unreformed, the eu is not an organisation within which any self respecting democracy should play any part.

And the eu will never engage in any radical reform of itself, a refusal with only one possible ending, however long that may take.

The EU is manifestly imperfect and bureaucratic, as are — at least in my personal experiene — the UK government, local government and higher education management. As we have heard today about Airbus, even in commerce there are occasions when certain employees are underhand, sometimes one suspects with the connivance of their managers. But we do not propose to shut Airbus down, abolish universities or our national government: we
work to improve them. We do not tear a house down because the roof leaks – we fix it, at least so long as we believe the house worth saving. To move quickly from critique to demolition speaks of a deeper conviction in favour of the ancient nation state. All well and good if this is what you believe. But let’s address that directly.

We can achieve, and just have, a major re-direction of this country’s government through the ballot box.

We cannot do that with the eu commission; the eu parliament a rubber stamp.

Britain’s senior civil servants, pro eu almost to a man, are properly appointed. And if they were not, the government of the day could be held accountable by the electorate. As the eu parliament has itself pointed out, that is very much not the case within the eu civil service.

The eu court is partial and politicised; only one aim, ever closer union.

The accounts of the eu have been qualified every year for twenty years.

I am a europhile who voted for the EEC in 1975. The scales fell from my eyes when the eu set its face against radical reform and gave the British Prime Minister nothing to sell to the electorate to retain this country as a member. False protestations of regret from senior eu politicians are risible in the extreme.

I have no personal interest in the break up of the eu. It is now an irrelevance to this country. But if it does not reform, radically, and, as we have seen, it cannot, it will simply wither on the vine……..

It is a pity that I have to start my comment by stating I voted remain and wished we had not left the EU. But such is the partisan tone of almost all debate I do so to prevent what I say being dismissed as the ravings of a little Englander.
In fact I only want to lodge my disappointment that an historian working at a somewhere as distinguished as the LSE is so clearly blindsided by his obvious disappointment at leaving the EU he is unable to bring any objectivity to his piece or his follow up relies to comments from others.
I’m not going to engage with all the points raised by Mr Clark about the need for nations to work together as allies ( with which I of course agree) but I find it telling that he makes no mention of NATO or the Council of Europe (neither of which the UK has left ) both of which it could be argued have played a far greater role in securing peace in Europe and the freedoms of its citizens than the EU.
Further it suggests that the only way to work with allies is to have not only a trading union but also a political union. I’m a 67 year old wealthy lawyer living in London but from a working class family. I’ve personally faired very well under 47 years of the EEC/ EU. Many like me have. Many working men and women in the UK who remained in manual trades have not.For me being a citizen of Europe meant something as I have the financial means to enjoy living in different countries or sending my children to European universities. They do not . For them being a British Citizen has a deeper meaning – it’s the only country they have. It’s a great pity that the debate became one about friendship and culture rather than money and politics. I’ve not felt the need to merge our country lime America , Australia, New Zealand or Indian ( amongst many other ) to keep our relationships one of cooperation and friendship. One lesson I learnt from my mechanic father ( who had little time for lawyer or other “pen pushing parasites on the working class “ ) was if one uses a screw to secure two pieces to metal it needed to to tightened well. But over tighten it and the strength of the joint is lost as the screw breaks.A metaphor for the ever closer union of the EU ?

I consider my comment to be robust but not offensive. It was not dissimilar to comments which have been accepted on other LSE blogs.

This should be seen in the context where I found the title of Prof’s Grayson’s article “WW2 has become a rallying point for Leavers” to be an offensive and unnecessary stereotyping of Leavers views, for which there is no justification within the text that followed.

I also pointed out (from memory) that the article was unbalanced in that it did not acknowledge the role that De Gaulle played in skewing the relationship between the UK and Europe, to create a misalignment that ultimately proved irreconcilable. It is all very well for the Professor to tell us that “I cheer at the fact that Churchill’s response to the imminent collapse of France was to offer an ‘indissoluble union’ between the UK and France”. But for balance he should also have recognised that De Gaulle twice vetoed the UK’s application to join Common Market declaring that “England is not much anymore”. The decision of France and the Benelux countries to draw in their former enemies does not seem particular magnanimous given that they also chose to dismiss their former ally on the basis that the country had suffered economic devastation in support of their liberation.

The moves towards European co-operation in the wake of WW2 ultimately leading to the formation of the EU were inevitably long and complex and were bound to be hampered by differences and disagreements between some very big personalities. It makes no sense to judge the entire outcome by dragging up what one or other of these personalities (such as de Gaulle) did or didn’t do or say.

We are talking about issues here which deeply affect not just Europe but the entire world.

NATO keeps the peace in Europe, not the EU. Besides even NATO or the EU could do much about the balkan conflict which happened in Europe under the noses of both of these organisations until much later, so I don’t think it disengenous to suggest they would be much use in any other skirmishes.

NATO is the main means by which the war-thirst US manages and keeps in line its European vassal states, which of course includes the UK. Try telling a Serbian or an Afghani or an Iraqi (not to mention others) that NATO “keeps the peace”. Blinkered nonsense.

Having worked for nearly four decades in UK higher education, including some involvement with the EU in the 1990s, I regret that the sins discovered in the EU are indistinguishable from those found in UK central government, local government and HE. I have heard similar tales from friends and colleagues working for the UN, US government, Congress etc. etc. Our response to these practices is to protest, protest and protest, despite the Sisyphean futility. We do not need to wish for or encourage the abolition of nations or institutions. The EU is certainly no more perfect that the government of the USA, but it works in the interest of 400m people and currently has high approval rating. The UK would surely be better spending its energies trying to fix it than wreck it.

“The UK would surely be better spending its energies trying to fix it than wreck it.”

At the founding of the EU, a shabby compromise was made to in order to placate national sensibilities whereby the EU would periodically decamp from Brussels to Strasbourg. Sixty years on and the organisation has not found the resolve to terminate this farcical arrangement. If they are incapable of resolving this they are incapable of more fundamental change.

Leavers were amused to observe that the first response of the EU to the Brexit vote was to call a meeting of the original member countries to consider their response. Their action perfectly confirmed the view that the EU is an undemocratic institution living in the past. The EU is an organisation where a formal vote by the UK was given the same worth as a vote by Luxembourg, but where informally Luxembourg held greater sway than the UK.

Robert with respect, I think in your last sentence you are confusing cause and effect. Luxembourg does not have a big influence on the EU because it has a large GDP per head. Rather, it has a large GDP per head because it has been able to exercise disproportionate influence. Only recently, the EU tried to introduce legislation which would require multinational companies to report what profits they made in each EU country and what tax they paid in those countries. Luxembourg was one of the countries to veto the legislation. Ireland was another. We all know why.

Are those decrying Professor Grayson’s views in this thread seriously arguing that the pursuit of narrow national interests by the patchwork of nations across our continent had nothing to do with past conflicts and would have nil likelihood of leading again in that direction? Nothing is perfect and there is much to do to improve aspects of the current EU institutions but trying to wreck what has already been achieved – surely one of the longest periods in history without war between major European nations – is a highly dangerous course to pursue. And it is not just the pursuit of British (or is it English) exceptionalism. The leading edge of the victorious brexiteers – exemplified by Farage – is now clearly dreaming of the destruction of the EU altogether.

And make no mistake – it is the EU which has entrenched the crucial degree of co-operation and friendship. NATO was formed to provide protection from external threats such as Russia might present – not to preserve internal peace between the democracies of Europe.

The original NATO treaty promoting peace security and justice, economic collaboration, stability and well being was signed on 04 April 1949.

‘Article 1

The Parties undertake, as set forth in the Charter of the United Nations, to settle any international dispute in which they may be involved by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security and justice are not endangered, and to refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations.

Article 2

The Parties will contribute toward the further development of peaceful and friendly international relations by strengthening their free institutions, by bringing about a better understanding of the principles upon which these institutions are founded, and by promoting conditions of stability and well-being. They will seek to eliminate conflict in their international economic policies and will encourage economic collaboration between any or all of them.’

Twelve countries took part in the founding of NATO: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In 1952, Greece and Turkey became members of the Alliance, joined later by West Germany (in 1955) and Spain (in 1982). NATO now has 29 members.

I am impelled to support what Denis Loretto says by observing that British troops are currently training to parachute into Estonia to bolster resistance to a Russian insurgency like that seen in Ukraine. Their life expectancy will be 12-24 hours. This is a small aspect of today’s military reality. Those who wish to dismantle European institutions must ask themselves whose interests this will serve.

British armoured formations are currently positioned in Estonia as part of OP CABRIT, this country’s contribution to NATO’s Baltic enhanced forward presence (EFP).

I see nothing in any comments above that recommends a dismantling of European institutions.

The only threat to the dismantling of European institutions has come from the East, and NATO, according to its 1949 remit, has dealt with it, allowing European institutions, from the European Coal and Steel Community from 1951 onwards, to flourish.

Indeed, from a security perspective, certainly, the eu has shown itself hopelessly incompetent, impotent, evidenced by its hopeless response to a very real invasion of over one million illegal immigrants in 2015. The military aspect, such as it is, of the eu is an irrelevance, a price now being paid for derisory military budgets across the continent, just about excepting France, and that will not change. The political will simply does not exist.

NATO will continue; the eu, unreformed, may very well not…..but that is very much up to its members, of which we are no longer one.

@Tim Bidie
Everyone knows that the main purpose of NATO is to provide a defence bulwark against potential external attack, particularly from communist countries. My point is that it is the EU which has entrenched the crucial degree of co-operation and friendship. Rehearsing what some see as failures against which I could list what others see as successes does not take anything away from that.

Let me post, again, article 2 of the North Atlantic treaty signed in 1949, two years before the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) agreement:

‘ Article 2

The Parties will contribute toward the further development of peaceful and friendly international relations by strengthening their free institutions, by bringing about a better understanding of the principles upon which these institutions are founded, and by promoting conditions of stability and well-being. They will seek to eliminate conflict in their international economic policies and will encourage economic collaboration between any or all of them.’

This is clearly far more than an undertaking just to provide military protection against any external threat. It is, explicitly, a commitment by the NATO signatories to strengthen their free institutions (like the ECSC) and to encourage economic collaboration……economic collaboration….between each other, well before the ECSC came into being.

And that is precisely what this country, as a founder NATO member, will continue to do.

However there has been very little cooperation and friendship on display within the eu commission regarding any much needed reform of the eu.

Clearly, many countries in Europe are very happy to belong to an expensive, inefficient, corrupt, politically unaccountable, imperial project from which they are net financial beneficiaries; unsurprising but perfectly in order for them as members of the eu.

But this country is not a net beneficiary, and, short of major reform requested by our Prime Minister, has chosen to leave; similarly unsurprising and similarly its entitlement as a member of the eu to depart under article 50.

The eu has set its face against radical reform. Britain has, consequently, decided to leave. Nothing to see here.

I am sure that Mr Grayson is well aware of the fact that the main factor in the defeat of Nazi Germany was the Red Army and Russia’s millions of casualties, but as usual the default position is not to mention that. Poor show Mr Grayson, and the Neo-con establishment scores another default propaganda victory.

Correct James – I’m fully aware of that (actually I make Soviet WWII aircraft in my spare time on the rare occasions there is any of the latter; and a great-aunt worked for Maisky in the Soviet embassy in London during WWII), but I was writing about membership of the EU (Russia is not a member of the EU, even though it is European), and also about the kind of things I saw in popular culture growing up (Red Army totally omitted for Cold War reasons). So it’s not from any neo-con sentiments that I didn’t discuss it, just the limits of space and also what was relevant to the alliances cemented within the EU. Had I been writing about ‘Who defated the Axis powers in the WWII?’ that would have come in, but it’s quite a different subject.

Anyone with relatives who earned themselves the Arctic Star would take issue with ‘the main factor in the defeat of Nazi Germany was the Red Army….’

‘”Now they say that the allies never helped us, but it can’t be denied that the Americans gave us so many goods without which we wouldn’t have been able to form our reserves and continue the war”

“We didn’t have explosives, gunpowder. We didn’t have anything to charge our rifle cartridges with. The Americans really saved us with their gunpowder and explosives. And how much sheet steel they gave us! How could we have produced our tanks without American steel? But now they make it seem as if we had an abundance of all that. Without American trucks we wouldn’t have had anything to pull our artillery with.”

Soviet General Georgy Zhukov

In value estimated at $500 billion in today’s money, more than 14,000 U.S. airplanes, 8,000 of which came from Alaska, were given to the Soviet Union in the course of the war. The USSR received a total of 44,000 American jeeps, 375,883 cargo trucks, 8,071 tractors and 12,700 tanks. Additionally, 1,541,590 blankets, 331,066 litres of alcohol, 15,417,000 pairs of army boots, 106,893 tons of cotton, 2,670,000 tons of petroleum products and 4,478,000 tons of food supplies.

The timing of early lend lease, mainly British tanks and fighter aircraft, in late 1941 at a time of maximum peril for the USSR, was particularly critical. The subsequent armoured offensives culminating in the capture of Berlin stretched USSR logistics to the extreme, only made possible by the huge numbers of U.S. cargo trucks supplied.
German tank reinforcements required in Russia by Von Manstein after the Kursk debacle went instead to North Africa; Alanbrooke’s strategic mastery turning the tide of the entire war.

This is by no means to undervalue the massive Russian contribution, and that of Marshal Zhukov, to final victory in Europe, but it is, rightly in my view, normally described as a victory of ‘The Allied Powers’; a team effort.

@Jams: “I am sure that Mr Grayson is well aware of the fact that the main factor in the defeat of Nazi Germany was the Red Army and Russia’s millions of casualties” I think it is simplistic to pick out a “main factor” like this, though obviously the resistance of the Soviet Union was hugely important. In any case I am not that willing to laud the leadership of the Soviet Union (as opposed to its citizens) because, by agreeing a peace deal which carved up large parts of Eastern Europe between them and the Nazis, they share responsibility for the invasion of Poland which started WW2 in the first place.

It is also not at all clear to me that Nazi Germany would have made war on the Soviet Union at all if it hadn’t been for the war with the British and the consequent need for petroleum and agricultural goods. One could conceive of a world in which the Nazis and the Soviets had divided up mainland Europe between them but managed to avoid actually invading each other.

I don’t see what this has all got to do with Brexit though, though it’s always pleasant to discuss our glorious island history. (And perhaps a good thing to talk about the not-so-glorious bits as well.)

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